Researcher Projects

Long-term Analysis of Ionospheric response during storm conditions

Ionospheric storm occurrence over Grahamstown and Madimbo, South Africa for 1996-2011. The
sunspot number and total number of geomagnetic storms are super-imposed (Matamba et al.,
(2015), Statistical analysis of the ionospheric response during geomagnetic storm conditions over
South Africa using ionosonde and GPS data, Space Weather, 13, 536-547)

It is well established that the ionospheric response to geomagnetic induced processes
depends on a number of factors including storm-time onset, season as well as
geomagnetic/geographic region. To this effect, a number of physical mechanisms have been
put forward for different ionospheric responses in different latitude regions. One
understanding is not easily transferable from region to another and varies from storm to
storm even within the same category. This study is statistically analysing ionospheric
response over a long-term (more than one solar cycle) using satellite and ground-based data
with an overall objective of categorising dominant mechanisms in different situations and
latitude regions.

The Space Science Directorate of SANSA is host to the only Space Weather Centre in Africa providing early warnings and forecasts on space weather activity, playing an important role in protecting satellite technology, communication and navigation systems.